"Self-possessed"

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Vanessa Waltz - USA

is how she managed to act, utterly composed

is how others would remember her acting, fiercely

attempting external calm is how I envision her acting

 

while her insides churned

while her insides churned as mine most surely do, imagining

the lieutenant rifling through her most private of papers

 

on things that were not limited to, but indeed included,

private grades, private thoughts, and not-so-private outbursts

things not limited to her time and place as a girl, but applicable

to my time and place as well

                                 as yours

 

she remained quite unlike the frolicsome little goat tugging at its tether image

an image she would (famously) choose to pin to herself, in critical contemplation

 

perhaps others now see her as such

though I see her simply       as Anne

                                   and as me

 

she remained still, hands at her sides as

letter after letter to Kitty fluttered down

 

to rest on the floor

 

the rest, as the history books note of her notes, is history

the rest, as my diary notes of her notes, is my history

See also

Anne Frank Huis. Bezoekers bij de draaibare boekenkast die de toegang naar het achterhuis verborg.
Anne Frank House. Visitors at the movable bookcase that hid the entrance to the secret annex.

We were very close

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Amy Miriam Strous (15 years) of Johannesburg, South Africa

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